Machine for arranging elongated articles lengthwise in rows and conveying the articles lengthwise of the rows



June 20, 1933.- L, R H, RT T AL 1,915,121

MACHINE FOR ARRANGING ELONGATED ARTICLES LENGTHWISE IN ROWS ANDCONVEYING THE ARTICLES LENGTHWISE OF THE ROWS Original Filed March 17,1931 4 Sheets-Sheet l Gum/minds J1me 1933- L. R. H. BURTON ET AL1,915,121

MACHINE FOR ARRANGING ELONGATED ARTICLES LENGTHWISE IN ROWS ANDCONVEYING THE ARTICLES LENGTHWISE OF THE ROWS Orlginal Filed March 17,1951 4 Sheets-Sheet 2 June 20, 1933. R BURTON r AL I 1,915,121

MACHINE FOR ARRANGING ELONGATED ARTICLES LENGTHWISE IN ROWS f ANDCONVEYING THE ARTICLES LENGTHWISE OF THE ROWS Original Filed March 17,1931 4 Sheets-Sheet 3 June 20, 1933. L R H, BURTON ET AL 1,915,121

MACHINE FOR ARRANGING ELONGATED ARTICLES LENGTHWISE IN ROWS ANDCONVEYING THE ARTICLES LENGTHWISE OF THE ROWS Original Filed March 17,1931 4 Sheets-Sheet 4 1 1W W KT; jjj; Hiiiij :5; I: I i1 i i i: s! '1 li i g i i 5 :i i I i I y H i i w I WE m Q 5 1 :5 m i E E O N +:t: 1:..\9 (\1 g, I \VR 6 f 9 In! Fo S a H I H 1 U 7 M cs i S g ::ll\ I :i

Patented June 20, 1933 UNITED STATES PATENT ()FFICE LEO R. H. BURTON ANDVERNON E, COOK, 0F ROME, NEW YORK MACHINE FOR ARRA'NGING ELONGATEDARTICLES LENGTI-IWISE IN ROWS .AND CONVEYING THE ARTICLES LENG-THWISE OFTHE. ROWS Original application filed March 17, 1931, Serial No. 523,314;Divided and this application filed March 17,

1932. Serial This invention relates to an apparatus or machine forarranging elongated articles lengthwise in rows and in the fullembodiment of the invention for conveying the articles lengthwise of therows. The apparatus or machine is particularly useful with a machine forcutting string beans or similar elongated vegetables into short piecesand the invention is illustrated and described in. connection with sucha stringbean cutter. It will be understood, however, that the sortingand feeding apparatus or machine of this invention may be used with amachine cutting other things than string beans such as celery, okra,rhubarb, asparagus and the like or may be used in sorting and feedingelongated articles preliminarily to their being conveyed to or operatedupon by other mechanism than a cutting machine, such other operationsincluding not only the actual operating upon or changing of the articlesbut the arranging or packaging of them into bundles or containers. Itwill be understood as appears from the claims that the invention is notlimited to that use, but may be employed in other situations.

The subject-matter of this application was formerly a part of ourapplication filed March 17, 1931, Serial Number 523,314.

The purpose of our present invention is to provide a new and improvedapparatus or machine for arranging elongated articles into rows and insome embodiments of our invention in conveying the said articles soarranged lengthwise of the rows; to provide an apparatus or machine ofthe character named which is so constructed and has its parts socombined as to be adapted to work with greater efficiency andregularity; to provide a machine of the character described that is welladapted to receive elongated articles such as string beans in anindiscriminate mass and sort the same into parallel rows in which thebeans are arranged lengthwise and 'to convey "them thus arrangedlengthwise of the rows towards another machine or device such as a beancutter; to have the arranging and feedingapparatus of such constructionand arrangement of its parts that the string beans or other articlesbeing another machine and particularly to have the discharge end of saidchute while still vibrating move in the direction of a part of a circleso as to follow closely the circle of a feed roll of the adjacentmechanism such as the feed roll of a bean cutter thus enabling thefeeding chute to move in a short curved path substantially concentricwith the adjacent face of the feed roller of the bean cutting machine sothat at no time can considerable portions of beans evade the cuttingmechanism nor. be cut or bruised by being caught between the deliveryend of the chute and the adjacent surface of the feed roller of thebean-cutting machine or other machine with which the. feeding mechanismis used.

A further purpose in such a machine is to provide means including amovable hopper and partitions fixed in said hopper leading to avibrating chute for aiding and arrangmg the elongated articles into suchparallel rows with said articles lengthwise thereof and to have suchmeans consist of such a movable hopper withfixed upright partitionsparallel with the said passageways and with said hopper and partitionsgiven a horizontal movement back and forth but transversely of or atright angles tothe length of said partitions.

Another purpose is to provide meansand combinations of parts andco-operation between the parts of such a machine that will result ingreater production or capacity of the machine.

Further purposes and advantages of our machine will appear from thespecification and claims herein.

. Fig. 1 is a side elevation of a machine embodying one form of ourinvention parts of the machine being broken away to more clearlyshow theconstruction. 7

Fig. 2 is a vertical sectional view from front; to rear of the machinemostly on line 2-2 of Fig. 3. 1

Fig. 3 is a vertical cross sectional view of the machine on line 3-3 ofFig. 2.

Fig. 4 is a top or plan view of the rear part of the machine, the lefthand end of the hopper and parts of its partitions being broken away tomore clearly show the construction.

Referring to the drawings in amore particular description it will beseen that the string bean cutting machine with which our presentinvention is herein illustrated, includes a suitable platform 10 havingseveral uprights 11 extending thereabove and supporting a table 12.Spaced apart upon the platform 10 are the side frame members 13 betweenwhich are mounted the knife roller 14 and the feeding and anvil roller15 upon shafts 16 and 17 respectively. The knife roller 14 comprises aroller proper 18 in which'are set parallel radially projecting knives 19theouter edges of which just meet the periphery of the roller 15 placedbelow the knife roller with said roller 15 operating as an anvil rollerand also as the feeding roller to feed the beans forward beneath theknife roller from the lower end of the vibrating chute 20. The vibratingchute has side frame members 21 at its opposite sides, a bottom 22 and aplurality of spaced parallel upwardly extending walls 23 forming thedesired number of spaced parallel guideways or passageways 24 slantingdownwardly to the meeting line of, said rollers from the opening 25 inthe table 12. The bottom of these passageways it will be seen slopesharply downwardly so as to let the beans arranged endwise therein slidedown towards the cuttin mechanism. In order to expedite this slidingaction, however, the said chute is given a rapid vibrating motion of theparticular character to be hereinafter described. The walls 23 extendupward so that their upper ends reach nearly to the level of the uppersurface of the table 12 but in all positions of the chute the said upperends of the walls. will be not above the said upper surface of thetable. About the outer edges of this table is an upstanding flange 26 toretain the articles upon the table if such articles are to be hand-fedto saidchute. Preferably, however, with this machine there will be usedthe automatic or power-feeding device consisting of the bodily movablehopper 55, partitions 58 and 59 fixed therein and described in detailhereinafter.

Preferably the shaft 17 carrying the feeding and anvil roller15 will bedriven through a train of gears 28011 shaft 17,47 an intermediate gearand 46 a gear on the main shaft 39 driven by power transmitted to apulley 27 on the right hand end of the machine as seen in Fig. 3. g Thesaid gear 28 on shaft 17 also meshes with an aligned gear 29 secured tothe shaft 16 carrying the knife-equipped roller 14.

At the opposite sides of the chute 20 near the upper rear end, that isright hand end of the chute as the parts are seen in Fig. 1, there areprovided two spaced hangers 30 secured to the under side of the table 12and providing bearings for the opposite ends of a shaft 31. This shaftis a little ways below the adjacent bottom side frame members 21 of thechute 20. From each frame member 21 there projects downwardly a bracket32. In the lower endof each one of these is the upper half 33 of acollar, the lower half 34 of which is detachably secured thereto, withsaid two half collars adapted to encircle an eccentric wheel 35 fixedupon the said shaft 31. The hangers 30 and the eccentric wheels 35 andcollar members 33 and 34 secured to the bracket 32 thus form the meansfor supporting the upper end of the chute 20, but of course this end ofthe chute being supported through said eccentric wheels will receive thecombined up and down motion and motion from right to left as the partsare seen in Fig. 1 incident to said support being through an eccentricwheel.

' Below the lower or left hand end of the chute as the parts are seen inFig. 1 there is suitably mounted in the spaced frame members 13 the mainshaft 39 to which are secured two similarly positioned eccentric wheels40 each one of which are about below the opposite sides of said chute20. Each of these eccentric wheels has its periphery enclosed by acollar formed of a half collar 41 detachably secured to the upper halfcollar 42 formed integral with or fixedly secured to the lower end of anarm 43. Theupper end of each arm has a. pivot'joint 44 upon the ear 45downwardly projecting from each side member 21 at the bottom edge of thechute 20. The shaft 39 carrying the eccentric wheels to operate thelower end of the chute 20 has fixed thereon the gear 46 which engagesthe intermediate gear 47 which in turn engages a gear 29 secured to theknife shaft 17. The two pairs of eccentric wheels are driven at the samespeed by the respective shafts being connected by a sprocket chain 36engaging at one end a sprocket wheel 37 fixed upon the lower or mainpower-driven shaft 39 and engaging at its upper end a similar sizedsprocket wheel 38 fixed upon the shaft 31 carrying the upper pair ofeccentric wheels 35. i i

The lower end of chute 20 is thus supported from the fixed frame members13, but being supported through intervening eccentric wheels 40 and arm43 and ear 45 the lower end of said chute is given the peculiar combinedmotion incident to being operated by an cecentric wheel.

It is to be noted, however, that the two sets of eccentric. wheels 35and 40 at the upper and lower ends ofsaid chute are not mounted with thelarge diameters of the eccentrics extending in the same direction at thesame time, but are on the contrary mounted with the two sets ofeccentric wheels at decidedly different positions. In fact in practicein the machine as here shown one set of the eccentrics are mountedpractically at right angles to each other. This is done in order to obtain the desired motion of the lower hori zontal edge 49 of the chuteadjacent the feed roller 15. The motion obtained is that this lower edge49 travels very close to the adjacent portion of the periphery of thefeed and anvil roller 15 and practically concentric therewith for anappreciable distance so that said lower edge travels practically in acurved direction back and forth following the curve of the periphery ofwheel 15. 111

this way the beans are at all times fed directly to the upper feedingsurface of said feed roller 15 relatively close to the meeting line ofsaid feed roller and the knife roller and there is at no time anyappreciable space between the said lower edge 49 of the chute and thefeed roller through which, portions of beans may drop and so evade beingproperly cut by the cutting mechanism. It will be seen that thisdifferent location or different relative setting of the two pairs ofeccentricwheels avoids locking of the eccentrics through the pivot joint44 provided between the arms 43 leading from the lower eccentrics to theadjacent lower end of the chute by means of the cars 45.

There will now be described that part of the machine relating moreparticularly to the apparatus for automatically feeding theindiscriminate mass of beans more regularly into the guideways 24 of thechute 20. The means we provide for so automatically feeding the stringbeans into said guideways comprises hopper 55 mounted to move back andforth bodily upon the table 12 immediately over the opening thereinleading to the guideways and the chute. This hopper preferably consistsof a lower portion 56 having vertically arranged walls in the form of arectangle and an upper portion 51' also rectangular but having wallswhich slant outwardly as they extend upwardly. In th1s hopper areprovided vertically arranged parallel partitions preferably of unequalheight and preferably forming two series as low partitions 58 and highpartit ons 59 alternately spaced apart as appears in Figs. 3 and 4.

These partitions are arranged parallel to the walls 23 forming the sidesof the guideways 24 of the chute therebelow and are preferably spacedapart the same distance as said walls of the chute. This entire hopperwith its partitions 58 and 59 is bodily moved in a horizontal directionback and forth for a short distance on the table 12 with such motionbeing at right angles to the partitions 58 and 59'andaccordingly atright angles .to the upper edges of the walls 23 forming the boundariesof the guideways 24 of the chute 20. The means for so supporting andmoving said hopper comprise two spaced rods 60 and 61 located to thefront and back respectively of the smaller lower portion of 1 the hopperand supported a short dis tance above the table 12 by upstandingbrackets 62 towards the front and similar brackets. 62 extending forwardfrom the back flange 26 of the box. upon these spaced rods and Glare theopposite ends of two clamping bars 63 engaging the right and left handends of the lower portion of said hopper as seen in Figs. 3 and 4. Theseclamping bars 63 are drawn against the adjacent ends of the hopper bymeans of rods 64 screw-threaded at their ends with one endscrew-threaded into the boss 65 on the right hand bar 63 and with theother end projecting through outwardly eX-- tending bosses 65 on theleft hand clamping bar 63 as seen in Figs. 3 and 4. The oppositeclamping bars are drawn tightly against the hopper by means of outernuts 66 engaging the said projecting screw-threaded ends of the rods 64.The joint thus made is locked by inner lock nuts 67 brought up againstthe inner end of said clamping bars on said rods 64.

It will be understood that the hopper is thus supported just above thetable but with its bottom close enough to the top of the table and tothe top edge of the walls 23 so as to guide the beans from between thepartitions 58 and 59 into the guideways 24. The extent of travel of thehopper is small relative to the width of the spaces between thepartitions 58 and 59 and the width of the guideways 24 so that thepartitions 58 and 59 only slightly pass to the right or left of l thewalls 23 therebelow as indicated respectively by the dash line anddotted line position of 58 and 59 in Fig.4 and so give no opportunityfor the beans to be cut or damaged or become clogged between the saidmoving parts. The last-mentioned result is further aided by having thelower edges of the partitions spaced up a little farther from the table.

The means for imparting the reciprocating motion to the hopper consistsof a connecting rod 68 having its inner end attached to one of theclamping bars 63. The other end of this rod is connected at 69 to theupstanding arm 7 O of a bell crank the fulcrum of which is the shortshaft 71 and the other arm 72 of which is pivoted to the upper end of alink 73 passing downwardly to a collar 74 engaging and encircling aneccentric wheel 7 5 mounted upon the projecting end of the main shaft39.

It will now be seen that we have produced a machine of the characterdescribed which is especially well adapted to accomplish the purposesand attain the objects men- Slidingly mounted tioned at the beginning ofthe specification. Particularly, it :will be seen that we have providedsafe and effective means for causing the lower edge of the chute beingthe edge that is close to the combined feeding and anvil roller to be atall times practically the same distance from the feeding roller,notwithstanding that the whole chute and this lower edge is beingrapidly reciprocated in order to shake down the beans in said chute. Thereciprocating movement of this lower end of the chute is so controlledthat the said lower edge'of the chute travels back and'forth a shortdistance circumferentially of the periphery of the combined feeding andanvil roller and so back and forth in a curved path which is at allpositions a substantially equal distance from the surface of the saidroller. This arrangement allows the lower edge of the chute to travelcloser to the feeding and anvil roller than was safe when the chutetraveled towards and away from the roller. Our machine prevents portionsof beans slipping between the said roller and the lower end of the chutewhere they would avoid being cut and would tend to clog the machine. Thepreviously used motion of having the lower edge of the chutesuccessively approach towards and receed from the roller allowed partsof beans to be crushed orbruised by being caught between the advancingchute and the relatively fixed roller, causing injury to the quality andappearance of the product. Our form of machine avoids such damage to thevegetablesbeing handled and so increases the quantity and quality of theproduct, by rea son of our chute avoiding the advancing or punchingmovement heretofore commonly used.

It will be seen also that the upper end of our chute isgiven a decidedand extended movement instead of the almost negligible movement of theoriginal Townsend string bean cutter and in this way our machine effectsa greatspeeding up of the feeding of the beans down the chute towardsthe cut-- ter. In the former machine the feeding action at the upper endof the chute was sluggish and far below the capacity of the cutter orkniferoller. I

This great speeding up by our new machine of the feeding of beansthrough the chute, however, only emphasizesthe slow feeding of the beansfrom the table above the chute down into the chute by hand operation ofa man or woman moving thebeans about. By providing the mechanicalfeeding device described herein for use on the table or in the bin abovethe chute, we not only save altogether the services of an operator tokeep feeding the beans from the table but by proper arrangement of themechanical or auto matic feeding device we get a feedin above the chutethat is always working an more over working faster than would bepossible for one operator. By combining these features to co-operate inone machine, we have produced a machine that very greatly increases theoutput of the machine and yet saves the services of an attendant.

It will now be apparent that as suggested earlier in the specificationthe machine herein described is not limited to use simply as a stringbean cutter, but may be used to operate upon other elongated vegetableproduce such as celery, okra, rhubarb and asparagus. Furthermore, itwill be obvious that the sorting and conveying mechanism hereindescribed may be used without change or with obvious mechanical changesto sort and convey vegetable produce to a machine other than acontinuously operating rotating cutter. For instance, thesorting andconveying apparatus .here shown may be readily used in connection with aproper cutting device to sort and convey string beans to a shippingmecl'ianism to cut the two ends from the beans or to cut the two endsfrom cucumber pickies or to out one or both ends from other elongatedvegetable produce.

It is obvious also that the sorting and conveying mechanism hereindescribed and illustrated may be used with machines other than th to cutor trim vegetable produce or may be used where no operation is to beperformed upon the produce other than ar ranging them temporarily intobundles or groups for further subsequent operations or where thearticles are arranged permanently into groups and at once placed intothe bottles, cans or other permanent containers therefor.

It will also be noted that the sorting and conveying mechanism hereindescribed and illustrated may be used either exactly as SllOWll or withobvious mechanical changes not involving invention to sort and conveyelongated articles of various sorts other than vegetable produce.

hat we claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent is:

'1. In amachinc for arranging and conveying elongated articles, thecombination of a chute having a slanting bottom and upstanding divisionwalls forming a plurality of parallel passageways slanting downwardlytowards the delivery end of the chute and adapted to feed the saidarticles endwise towards said delivery end and means including eccentricwheels adjacent the opposite ends of said chute, said eccentric wheelsbe ing set at different points for movably mounting said chute so thatits delivery end will have a movement back and forth following the curveof part of acircle, a hopper arranged closely over the upper end of saidchute and having fixed in its lower part, upright partitions extendingin the same direction as, and spaced corresponding to, the

division walls of said chute, said hopper being mounted to bereciprocated horizontally a short distance transversely of the length ofits partitions and of the length of said passageways of the chute andmeans to so move said hopper.

2. In a machine for arranging and conveying elongated articles, thecombination of a chute having a slanting bottom and upstanding divisionwalls forming a plurality of parallel passageways slanting downwardlytowards the delivery end of the chute and adapted to feed the saidarticles endwise towards the said delivery end and means includingeccentric wheels adjacent the opposite ends of said chute, saideccentric wheels being set at difierent points for movably mounting saidchute so that its delivery end will have a movement back and forthfollowing the curve of part of a circle, a hopper arranged closely overthe upper end of said chute and having fixed in its lower part uprightpartitions alternately of difierent heights and extending in the samedirection as, and spaced corresponding to, the division walls of saidchute, said hopper being mounted to be reciprocated horizontally a shortdistance transversely of the length of its partitions and of the lengthof said passageways of the chute and means to so move said hopper.

3. In a machine for arranging elongated articles lengthwise in rows andconveying the same so arranged lengthwise of the rows, the combinationof a hopper to receive the articles indiscriminately and having spacedparallel upstanding partitions fixed in the lower part of the hopper,said hopper being movably mounted to move back and forth horizontallytransversely of the length of said partitions, a chute located beneathsaid hopper and having upstanding walls spaced apart substantially thesame distance as the partitions in the said hopper and paralleltherewith and in alignment with the average position of said hopperpartitions, whereby the articles sorted into a row between adjacentpartitions of the hopper fall into the space between adjacent wallstherebelow, the said chute having a bottom slanting clownwardly as itextends in the line of said partitions away from the end of the chute immediately beneath said hopper, and means for reciprocating said chute inthe direction of its walls.

4. In a machine for arranging elongated articles lengthwise in rows andconveying the same so arranged lengthwise of the rows, the combinationof a hopper to receive the articles indiscriminately and having spacedparallel upstanding partitions fixed in the lower part of the hopper,said hopper being movably mounted to move back and forth horizontallytransversely of the length of said partitions, a chute located beneathsaid hopper and having upstanding Walls spaced apart substantially thesame distance as the partitions in the said hopper and paralleltherewith and in alignment with the average position of said hopperpartitions whereby the articles sorted into a row between adjacentpartitions of the hopper fall into the space between adjacent wallstherebelow the said chute having a bottom slanting downwardly as itextends in the line of said partitions away from the end of the chuteimmediately beneath said hopper, and means for reciprocating said chutelengthwise thereof and up and down in the direction of its walls.

In witness whereof we have affixed our signatures, this fourth day ofMarch 1932.

LEO R. H. BURTON. VERNON E. COOK.

